


Welcome to Madness

by melwil



Category: MASH (TV)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-04-10
Updated: 2011-04-10
Packaged: 2017-10-17 20:41:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 433
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/180986
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/melwil/pseuds/melwil
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Hawkeye introduces BJ to the war. Set after 'Welcome to Korea'</p>
            </blockquote>





	Welcome to Madness

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted in 2002

Hawkeye slid a cup of coffee across the table. "Thick as mud and half as tasty. It should sober you up a little."

"Do I want to be sober over here?" BJ wrapped his hands around the mug. "If nothing else, the alcohol would warm me up."

"Sure." Hawkeye nodded. "It would be real easy to live in a pickled state of consciousness. In fact, this place almost demands it. But it does make surgery a tad difficult."

"I suppose." BJ sipped at his coffee. "This stuff is terrible!"

"Don't say I didn't warn you." Hawkeye stretched his arms out behind his head. "I'm beat."

"Well, it was quite the day."

"Yeah." Hawkeye rubbed his eyes. "You know, when I first got here, all I wanted to do was throw up."

"True?" BJ swallowed another mouthful of coffee. "I don't think I've ever drunk anything as bad as this."

"Wait until you taste the lighter fluid I know fondly as martini." Hawkeye waved his hand dismissively. "I saw this place and I wanted to throw up. The first trip to the latrine, the first meal, the first time I was awaken by the choppers flying overhead. All of it and I just wanted to blow cookies."

"It's really that bad?"

"It is. But it was the first time that I did surgery that was the worst. It was an eighteen hour blinder, non stop casualties. But by the time I'd finished with it, I was too numb to even think about being sick. Throwing up was impossible."

BJ rested on his elbow. "So what did you do?"

"I went back to the Swamp and sat on my cot. Just sat there, blood stained clothes and everything. I put my head between my knees, and, I just cried." Hawkeye looked past BJ, looked out of the mess tent, and into the compound beyond. "I just cried."

"It seems like the right kind of place for it."

"That it is, my friend." Hawkeye shook his head. "There's no place on the world quite like it, thank God."

BJ finished his coffee. "Should we be heading for some sleep now?"

"We could." Hawkeye stood up as the familiar refrain of the choppers came into hearing range. "But I think we'll be needed in surgery."

"At this time of night?"

"The war doesn't have a reliable watch, sadly." Hawkeye led BJ out of the mess tent, past people rushing madly out of their tents. "Just time to go to work."

"And time to throw up."

"And time to eat World War Two rations."

"Can't wait for that."


End file.
